From “The Worst Night Ever Part 2” by Joshua Sylvester Guthrie

The golden tiger that escaped from the zoo was on my roof. I don’t know why, but it got up there and it couldn’t get down. Mom was kind of upset about it, even though I was all like “Mom, come on, there’s a wall and a window between it and us. It’s just a tiger, it’s not Superman.”

Anyway, she took me out of my room and called Animal Control. They took forever to get there. Mom wouldn’t let us go outside, but she seemed really worried about Mr. Snugglepuss more than us.

Okay, so, Mr. Snugglepuss wasn’t the tiger. Maybe he was a snugglepuss but that wasn’t his name. I forget his name. But Mr. Snugglepuss was our cat. He was 17 years old, mostly blind, mostly deaf, and mean. Like, the meanest cat ever. Like if the tiger ran into Mr. Snugglepuss I’d feel sorry for the tiger. Mom wouldn’t let anyone but her touch Mr. Snugglepuss and she still always had claw marks on her from trying to snuggle the unsnuggleable.

So anyway, Animal Control eventually came by with people from the zoo. They shot the tiger with a tranquilizer and got it down safe. I wish Mom had let me see the tranqulizer gun but she wouldn’t. And then they got the tiger packed up and put away and the Animal Control guy comes to the door. He says it’s safe and we’re okay and the tiger’s okay. But then he kind of stops and looks at his shoes.

Mom asked him what happened and he said that there had been some “collateral damage.” I guess he hit something? Yeah. The Animal Control truck ran over Mr. Snugglepuss. They didn’t even notice until they were going to leave and they saw his tail sticking out.